As 2009 is coming to an end, it is expected that a blog should post something for the special occasion (I didn’t do anything in 2007 and 2008. I can’t believe it.). Most of the anime blog will surely post about best/worst anime of the year, best OP/ED, best character or something of that sort. Well, I can’t do that since I’m the only author of this blog and there is no way I could have watched all the shows released this year. The best/worst list would not do justice for the anime I didn’t watch. This post is my solution.
[WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD.]
I’d like to summarize some moments in anime I experienced this year that brought greatest impact on me. Whether the anime are good or bad is not the point in this post (some of the anime listed here has already been reviewed, you can check them out.). Here’s the list.
ONE: The deadly rain drops
There are countless jaw-dropping action scenes in Darker Than Black: Gemini of the Meteor but the battle between April and Goran at the end of the first episode strikes me hardest for many reasons. The technical details is so well done with the bullets moving in slow motion and Goran moving at incredible speed. In this scene April, the only familiar face from the first season, dies. What a shock. And lastly, who would expect a rain drop to be so deadly. The bottonline is that I was totally blown away.
TWO: The winged woman
Eden of the East contains many good moments but the one I remember so vividly is the scene that is extremely puzzling and fantastic. I didn’t expect Shiratori to suddenly spread out wings and literally fly away. I knew that Juiz was behind every thing and it was only an illusion but the anime didn’t clearly explain how Juiz did that. To me, this scene is borderline impossible and that’s why I can’t forget it. (read my review of this anime here)
THREE: The Nogizaka Maid Team introduction
Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu Purezza may be inferior to its predecessor but there is one scene that really makes me smile. I admit that this kind of scene is not even remotely original but I found it really amusing to see those pretty maids introduce themselves with all those funny equipments. Oh! they even have a maid specialized in chemistry!
FOUR: A very dangerous cart driver
Phantom: Requiem for the Phantom is a great anime (see my review here) and it is also the first anime that makes me want to fly to Japan and mercilessly murder the anime’s creators. I was heart broken and enraged when a cart appeared behind Reiji, a sound of gunshot was heard faintly and Reiji fell down, smiling. Though I later realized that this ending was quite brilliant in certain ways, my heart has already been wounded and it would probably never heal.
FIVE: Another side of Sawako Sensei
I might have a lot to complain about K-ON! (read my review here) but I must admit that several scenes in this anime really makes me laugh, a genuine one, not merely smirk or smile. And the best laugh it gave me came from this scene in which the shy Sawako Sensei went berserk when her past as a rocker was about to be revealed. The funniest thing was that when Sawako started leaping, people started moving furniture around the hallway at the same time.
SIX: If your voice is lethal, always carry a pen!
Anyone who has seen Canaan must at least vaguely remember this scene. Hakko whose voice is lethal due to viral induced mutation, is tricked by Liang Qi into unintentionally attacking her lover, Santana. In his last moment, Santana asked Hakko to say ‘I love you’ and by saying those words, Hakko killed him. After I was done wiping my tears, I realized that Hakko should have carried a pen because writing ‘I love you’ on a piece of paper was perfectly safe!
SEVEN: Yuuki fading away
Despite the controversy surrounding it, Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 undoubtedly succeeds in creating one of the most emotional ending sequence of the year. I knew that Yuuki was dead long before watching the final episode but the scene in which Yuuki slowly faded away and Mirai, holding her mother, could not stop the tears from flowing down her cheeks was just too painful to watch. Hell, I think I’m going to cry again.
That’s all I can think of right now. Nevertheless, there are several others that surely deserve a spot in the list but they slipped my mind or I haven’t watched them. If you have any suggestions, please share them here.
In general, 2009 was a decent year for me. There were lots of good anime released throughout the year but, unfortunately, none of them was universally praised by anime fans and none of them could earn A+ rating from me. Hopefully, 2010 will be different.
ps. My review on Canaan and Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 will be published early next year (I’m always late, I know) but for Darker Than Black 2 and Nogizaka 2, I’ll review them when they are complete.
Canne's anime review blog 
Some really good choices there – I loved that particular action scene in DtB: Ryuusei no Gemini too, Eden of the East had too much greatness to pick one moment out for I think, and Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 was magnificent in a number of ways.
The only choice here I would probably have omitted personally was from CANAAN – Jaw-dropping action scenes aside, that show really didn’t do anything for me.
Aside from that particular scene, Canaan didn’t earn very high rating from either (I’m currently working on its full review ;))
Ah the wing scene in Eden. That was a real HOLY SHI- moment because up until then everything had kept within the lines of actually possibly happening. Evil winged demons was a bit of a shock (until the reveal it was an illusion that is). My personal favourite Eden scene is definately the final scene with Takizawa shooting down the missiles with his finger-gun, Sundance Kid style.
My favourite scene of the year was an FMA one though. I’ll keep this comment spoiler free just in case, but Roy Mustangs ‘I SEALED IT WITH FIRE’ was just so awesome!
The missiles scene is also one of the best but I choose the wing scene because it is totally unexpected, not just ‘wow’ :)
I haven’t made good progress on FMA Brotherhood but I’ll eventually get around to it.
Darker Than Black, K-On!, Higashi no Eden, Requiem for the Phantom, Canaan (Probably because of characters and action scenes) are the anime that had the biggest impact on me these past months, still, none of them I’d consider as good as Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, which is my current #1 show.
Nevertheless, good picks! Maybe I wasn’t that impressed with the wings scene in Higashi no Eden, but that surely was damn disturbing when I saw that being one episode before the actual episode where it happened, mostly I liked the mystery all around that serie and the moment when they were exploring the mall.
K-On!, even though it was ‘worse Lucky Star’, I liked it as one of the few anime focusing on music and instruments, that aspect here was really nice. Oh and Mio, god I <3 Mio! @_@
The whole 'Second-part' of Phantom was just awesome, even though it had some serious mistakes in it, I still enjyoed it till the very end.
Darker than Black: Gemini of the Meteor – surprisingly I enjoy it a lot even though I can't remember anything from the first serie anymore, action scenes are just epic, only annoying thing is that sailor-moon transformation of our new heroine, but apart from that it's awesome.
The other ones I haven't seen, but Maid Team looks damn convincing!
‘…only annoying thing is that sailor-moon transformation of our new heroine’
LOL, I never think of that but it does look like sailor transformation!
I found myself wanting a lot from this year and didn’t really feel like I got my fill. It wasn’t as spectacular a year as what we’ve had comparatively to the past. Oh well.
I’d probably toss some Clannad in there since that made up a major part of 2009’s enjoyment. Ditto for Natsume Yuujinchou which carried itself well from the first season. Eve no Jikan had some good moments too.
What you said reminds me that there’s no romance/drama anime in my list at all. There’s only tragedies and death and silly girls! Maybe I’ve had a stressful year? I don’t know.
Moments 2, 6, 7 were for sure up there for me as well!
I seriously need to know what’s up with Nogizaka’s Maid #2.
Lovely :) All these were actually pretty decent :D
The raindrops in dtb was amazing!! I can watch it over and over and still be amazed xD Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 was extremely boring, I fell asleep the whole time I watched it but surprisingly I finished it and on the last ep it was just so sad! I feel like crying if I had to rewatch it omg T_T I didn’t know that Yuuki was already dead, well I guess I didn’t want to THINK he was so I believed he wasn’t dead xD until the end~
@ Chii- everyone seems to agree with Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 :)
@ Baka-Raptor- Nogizaga2 is fun but I still hesitate to recommend it.
@ FaS- Yeah, it’s been a decent year at best
@ Ruby- I watch it so many times as well :)
K-On! is the only anime I’ve seen from that list. That scene is really kind of funny though. Both my sister and I laughed, not just chuckled, when we watched it.
Don’t worry. This list does not represent the best of 2009. :)
Tricky post as I tried to avoid the spoilers… Matrix style. :p
2 didn’t leave that big of an impression. Although I was surprised by the wings.
4.. Wasn’t exactly too fond of the anime, if you remembered. :p
5 Hmm.. Thing about comedies. It’s hard for them to leave a strong impression. Especially lasting ones. Even more so when compared to “heavier” animes.
Taking a recently talked about anime as example, I can still remember how Now and Then, Here and There or maybe a more recent anime, Casshern Sins ended. But I can’t remember much from K-On! or Kannagi. Despite loving all 4 of them.
Just my 5 bucks and 37 cents.
Hey, what can I say? My thoughts aren’t cheap. Xp
Ok… It’s obvious that my comment have sidetracked.
I guess I just wanted to say that 5 didn’t leave much of an impression too. -.-”
Yeah.. That was it.
Personal pick would be 6 and 7.
Hakko state was so saddening. Even now just remembering her history and what became of her moves me a little.
I was hoping that the male photographer would be able to give her some form of happiness in the end. But I’m sure we all know that wasn’t to be.
Yuki’s part was just touching. Through and through.
Haven’t touch the others yet. :)
Hmm.. I didn’t know Clannad was 2009. I thought it was from 2008. Dang… Bye2 Guin Saga. -.-“
It’s true that heavier anime leave greater impact than lighter/comedy ones. When I wrote this post, I was expecting a good deal of disagreement since it’s quite hard to find truly impressive anime this year (pick up 7 of them is hard enough). But at least most of the readers agree on Yuuki and Hakko :)
I think it depends on how good the anime is. I loved the hell out of Eden of the East, and well DtB what not to love.
But I’m just as enthusiastic about Kimi ni todoke, lighter in tone than either of the previous two I just mentioned, but it leaves just a great an impact on me.
Its a terrific cute, shoujo anime.
Oh! The truth is I haven’t made good much progression with Kimi ni Todoke. The first few episodes did really well overall but I still can’t pick up any specific moments. BTW, Thanks for the blogroll and for dropping by :)
Kimi ni todoke is a good translation of a manga to anime. I think the arc with Chizu is particularly good.
I just love her character, she makes me think of Arisa from Fruba.
No probs, its always good to make friends with other blogs :)
Very interesting posts and it remind me great scene even if i didn’t saw all the one described here.
Darker than black is an anime who have a special place in my heart and you made me want watch it again.
K-on is just cute, i laughed hard on that scene with Sawako sensei.
I discovered your blog and i’m already enjoying it. :)
Thank you for stopping by! I’m glad you like my post :)
Actually, I kinda want to watch DTB again myself.
I’m new to the blog “world” and mine is just few days old but i’ll be happy if you visit me once in a while :)
Mistyped my nickname on the first comment sorry :)
I rewatched whole first season and first episode of DTB and the most touching/awesome scene I consider the first appearance of Hei in the first ep of Gemini of the Meteor after April leaves the pub, actually, just his legs, but awesome OST in the background made it just precious.
Oh yes! I do recall that scene. It was both exciting and puzzling at the same time. Hei always knows how to enter the scenes :)
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nice review